


Seeing Memories

by Metallic_Sweet



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: (breaking the Socratic method and softly the fourth wall), Absurdism, Canon Compliant, Character Study, Class Issues, Gen, Historical References, Philosophy, The Myth of Sisyphus, The Plague/La Peste
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-24
Updated: 2020-04-24
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:55:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23821927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Metallic_Sweet/pseuds/Metallic_Sweet
Summary: A philosopher appears in a classroom in Garreg Mach. Dimitri, Claude, and Edelgard follow.
Relationships: No Romantic Relationship(s)
Comments: 11
Kudos: 47





	Seeing Memories

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dmajor7th](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dmajor7th/gifts).



> This fic contains direct quotations from Albert Camus' _The Plague/La Peste_ , specifically regarding the illness and death of Father Paneloux from (and yet not from) the plague. It also centres heavily upon class, war, and the nature of life and death. 
> 
> At the time of this fic's publishing, the themes of this work may be particularly troubling to the reader. Please exercise caution in reading this fic.

******0.** the scene

The philosopher sits upon one of the old student benches. He gazes at the stone hearth. The bookshelves, full of tomes. The blackboard, heavily marked with chalk. He does not understand it because it is full of diagrams of magic. The sigil for Fire. How it evolves into the first half of the sigil for Bolganone. 

“That is different,” he says to the student who has appeared. 

The student moves. Exacting and unchildish. They sit on the other end of the bench.

“How?” the student asks. “Who are you?”

The philosopher turns to them. 

“I am a philosopher,” he says. “My name is Albert Camus.” 

To the student, this is clearly a strange name but less strange occupation. They study him. He is not an old man, and he never will be. He wears a three-piece suit. His hair is dark and thick, although his hairline at his forehead is receding. He smells of tobacco and a strange, unidentifiable musk.

“You are not from Fódlan,” the student observes. 

“Is that what this place is called?” the philosopher asks. 

“Yes,” the student says. “Where are you from?”

“You would not have heard of it,” the philosopher says. “It is very far from here.” 

Slowly, the student begins to gain shape. Form. 

**i.** Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd 

> _“You have none of the specific symptoms of the disease,” Rieux told him. “But I admit one can’t be sure, and I must isolate you.”_
> 
> _The Father smiled queerly, as if for politeness’ sake, but said nothing._

“Being here,” Dimitri says, glancing at the blackboard, “makes me feel as if I am a young man again.”

“Are you no longer a young man?” the philosopher asks. 

Dimitri pauses. He turns his attention back to the philosopher. He is a non-threatening but unsettling presence. He is solid but immaterial. 

“I have not been the young man who took lessons here in a long time,” Dimitri says because he senses this is either one of his more bizarre hallucinations or a dream. “I was a student here before the war.” 

“I had a war, too,” the philosopher says, and he sits straighter and looks at Dimitri. “Is your war still going on?” 

Dimitri nods. This is a dream, he decides. His ghosts would never be so poorly informed. 

“Yes,” he says, examining the philosopher again. “You truly must be from quite far away. I am Dimitri Alexandre of House Blaiddyd, King of the Holy Kingdom of Faerghus. We are at war with the Adrestian Empire. It is ruled by the Emperor Edelgard von Hresvelg, who began this savagery. Until recently, the Leicester Alliance, which is governed by the Roundtable, was headed by the Duke Claude von Riegan, but he has gone east. The Roundtable now assists the Kingdom’s cause.” 

The philosopher blinks. “Well,” he says, taken aback but his eyes focused, “that is very different. We must be from different worlds altogether. And different times.”

Dimitri blinks, too. “Different worlds, I can believe,” he says because of all that has come to pass with Byleth and others, he must. “But different times?” 

The philosopher rests an arm on the desktop. “Have you heard of an automobile? An aeroplane?” 

Dimitri stares at the philosopher. The blankness in his gaze draws a faint smile to the man’s face. Not mocking. A simpler amusement. 

“That is alright,” he says, waving a hand at the blackboard. “After all, it seems you have knowledge for which I have no comprehension.”

Dimitri nods. Accessing rather than acquiescing. He glances at the blackboard before returning his gaze to the philosopher. 

“Few people have enough education to understand that,” Dimitri says, level but with underlying passion, “and even fewer have the talent to use it. Most people live bitter, short lives. They work hard and are not allowed to learn to read and write. They toil, fruitless for themselves but essential to keep our society going. They do not view their toil as worthless because it is not, but they do not get to see the fruits of their labours because those are taken away by those who would keep them in their place.” 

The philosopher digests Dimitri’s words as he speaks. He breathes in after Dimitri finishes, studying the student carefully.

“You said you are King.”

Dimitri nods. The philosopher tilts his head slightly. Thoughtful.

“Would you work to change this, if you win the war?”

“Yes,” Dimitri says, hard and harsh and more the man he has grown to be. “I will.”

The student’s form begins to change.

**ii.** Claude von Riegan

> _“Thanks. But priests can have no friends. They have given their all to God.”_
> 
> _He asked for the crucifix that hung above the head of the bed; when given it, he turned away to gaze at it._

“Oh!” Claude says, blinking rapidly as he takes in the philosopher, the classroom, the windows, the doors, and finally the philosopher again. “I have never seen clothes like yours.” 

This draws a smile to the philosopher’s face. “I suppose you wouldn’t,” he says, observing Claude with sharp eyes. “You are quite different from your classmate.” 

Claude laughs. It is an easy laugh. He can tell the philosopher knows it is not entirely honest.

“You will have to tell me which classmate it was,” he says, cheerfully. “I once had quite a few.” 

“Did you all go to war?” the philosopher asks. 

Claude smiles like his laughter. “Everyone goes to war,” he says, not lightly.

The philosopher nods, easier than Claude expected. He smiles, a similar one to Claude’s own. They do no good underestimating each other. 

“You would agree,” the philosopher says, mild and unassuming, “that what matters are the differences in experience.” 

Claude nods. He glances at the windows again. The pale light gives away little of where the sun is in the sky. 

“This is not real,” he concludes. 

“Not for me,” the philosopher says, drawing Claude’s attention back. “I am dead in my world.”

There is no bitterness. The philosopher seems neither bothered nor pleased with his current state. He is not at all like the 10 Elites reanimated beneath the earth nor the beasts and mechanical dolls. 

“Did you die due to war?” Claude asks because he is curious.

“No,” the philosopher says, and he laughs like it amuses him. “It was an automobile accident.”

Claude blinks. Automobile. Automatic. Mobile. The philosopher smiles wider at his confusion. 

“Your classmate, the King, gave me the impression that they do not exist here.” 

“They do not,” Claude confirms. “Dimitri was here?” 

“Yes,” the philosopher says, tapping his fist into his other hand’s palm. “I guess you are Duke Claude von Riegan?” 

“I have given up that name,” Claude says, and he smiles a little thinly. “It was only partially mine anyhow. When I came to this place, I was a different man. A boy, really. I came looking for somewhere to belong, only to find the place I belonged was both nowhere and everywhere. When I realised this, the war came. I kept the name because it would allow me to survive the war, and I have given it up now that it no longer serves me. I am not like my classmates, who had things here they felt they should die for.” 

The philosopher eyes Claude as if he is the most interesting thing in this world. For a dead man, perhaps Claude is. 

“What would they die for?” 

Claude smiles. A real one.

“I am not the person to ask that question,” he says as his form begins to change. 

**iii.** Edelgard von Hresvelg 

> _Even at the height of his fever Paneloux’s eyes kept their blank serenity, and when, next morning, he was found dead, his body drooping over the bedside, they betrayed nothing. Against his name the index card recorded: “Doubtful case.”_

Edelgard grimaces by thinning her lips against her teeth. She does not show her teeth. She reaches up and pushes her hair where it brushes her cheek. The grimace deepens as her hand falls away. 

“This is strange magic,” she says, looking over the philosopher, the desks and benches, the walls and ceilings. “I have not encountered a mage with this power.” 

“Neither have I,” the philosopher says, drawing her attention back to him. “In my life, I encountered no magic except what humans made possible.” 

“How lucky,” Edelgard says, cold in her frankness. “Somehow I sense you are both not of this world and are telling the truth. I also know your name and that you are dead, but you are not a Fell beast or mechanical doll. Others have been here before me.” 

“I am curious about beasts and dolls,” the philosopher says, with similar frankness but not as cold. “In my world, we have myths about beasts. We have built things perhaps similar to your dolls. I saw those in my war.” 

Edelgard eyes him. “Tell me.” 

The philosopher does not breath in. Nor out. He has not breathed at all in the entire time they have been here. 

Why would he, when he is dead? 

“The King,” the philosopher says, and Edelgard feels a sigh bubbling in her chest that she does not allow to move her body, “said you are Emperor, and you began your war.” 

“The war would have been made regardless,” Edelgard says. “I would rather it begin on my own terms, even if I could not convince many to join me. Dimitri and Claude are lucky that they have people who adore them to willingly suffer and die for them. You see me, philosopher. I am not someone people will love and lay down their lives for, if they think their choices over.” 

“Ah,” the philosopher says; he does not smile, just as she does not. “You know something they do not.” 

Edelgard nods. She looks to the walls behind the blackboard and before the bookcases. She sees memories. It is a look they both know well. 

“I know exactly what I have done,” she says, to the memories and the philosopher. “One day, I may be understood. Otherwise, I am happy to be known as a monster or forgotten. I would rather have my war on my own terms than a war where all that I love perishes.” 

The philosopher inclines his head. She sees he has begun to fade, much like the rest of the classroom with its sunlit windows and warming hearth. None of this scenery was necessary except to make her and her classmates feel secure. Their bodies, long left behind in their short academy days, are as immaterial as the dead philosopher. 

“We had a war like that,” the philosopher says, growing more and more distant. “When I was a very little boy.” 

“But that was not your war,” Edelgard says.

She can feel herself waking. Stirring. Her command from earlier will not be answered, but she never had the power to command the dead. No one does. No matter what whispers in Dimitri’s ears. No matter how viciously Claude clings to life. 

“No,” the philosopher says.

It is not angry. It is not sad. It is simply matter of fact. 

“There are always other wars.”

**0.** The argument

If this was not a dream, and the philosopher was not dead, and they had all been students again:

Each person struggles upwards on a hill. They push their burdens on an incline so steep that sometimes all they can see is that great load. At the crest of the hill, they slip, and they tumble down. Sometimes to the base of the hill. Sometimes only a few steps back. And sometimes still further and further until they find another hill, and the process begins again. 

Is it futile? Perhaps. The cycles of war and peace, of plague and recovery, of birth and death repeat throughout the endless breaking and unbreaking of the world. To know this, to acknowledge it, to understand it:

_It is life. That is all._

**Author's Note:**

> Feel free to connect with me on [Twitter @Metallic_Sweet](https://twitter.com/Metallic_Sweet)!


End file.
